A change the way Ubuntu 9.04 notifies you of updates

24 April 2009557 views7 Comments

A change to the Update Manager in Ubuntu 9.04 (Jaunty Jackalope) makes it to where you are no longer notified about software updates in the system tray on a daily basis. In Ubuntu 8.10 you were notified on a daily basis of any software updates. In 9.04 you will be notified on a daily basis if there are security updates, however, you will only be notified on a weekly basis for non security updates.

Ubuntu 9.04 introduces a change to the handling of package updates, launching update-manager directly instead of displaying a notification icon in the GNOME panel. Users will still be notified of security updates on a daily basis, but for updates that are not security-related, users will only be prompted once a week.

Users who wish to continue receiving update notifications in the previous manner can restore the earlier behavior using the following command (in the terminal window):

[…] A change to the Update Manager in Ubuntu 9.04 (Jaunty Jackalope) makes it to where you are no longer notified about software updates in the system tray on a daily basis. In Ubuntu 8.10 you were notified on a daily basis of any software updates More here […]

# 26 April 2009 at 2:07 pm

Klap-in said:

Next to above option, it is possible to change the ‘regular auto launch interval’. This in my humble opinion a more clear way.

– Start the configuration Editor (you can type ‘gconf-editor’ on your terminal)
– Look for /apps/update-notifier
– In this folder are listed 4 options (one is the above mentioned ‘auto_launch’).
– Another one of these is: regular_auto_launch_interval. Here you can define the interval in days when auto launching the update-manager for normal updates.

# 26 April 2009 at 4:35 pm

stlouisubntu said:

@ Klap-in:

I have always wanted more customization than the update manager has allowed. The only option in gnome have been advise of updates daily, weekly, or every two weeks. My preference is every 30 days (call me dangerous and crazy) so the only way for me to do that is to disable the update notifier completely and then check manually every 30 days. I assume that your advice would also apply to however many days any user might desire (also I am still running hardy heron.)

I think that the problem is the ‘-‘ before ‘type’. Cutting and pasting the line causes the error. Try replacing the offending character (which appears as a long dash) with –.

# 30 April 2009 at 12:26 pm

cJ (author) said:

@Alan Barnard I had the same problem on another post.. For some reason the double dash was being turned into a single dash by WP. I have changed them to the ascii code, and now it should appear correct. Thanks!

# 30 April 2009 at 2:53 pm

Alan Barnard said:

Ah! now I see the problem. I typed two separate hyphens and this site changed it into one long dash. Try typing ‘hyphen hyphen’ before ‘type’.